A media blitz by US Energy Secretary Chris Wright in Europe is driving home what the EU really committed to when it pledged to buy $750 billion in American energy products through to 2028 – and suggests it may ease some regulations.
Two visions of Europe’s energy future clashed this week. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen described an “Independence Moment.” The very next day, US President Donald Trump’s envoy was in town delivering Washington’s message.
Wright, a former fracking executive, embarked on a whirlwind tour of the Brussels political and media establishment. He spoke to commissioners, reporters, think-tankers – and noticeably chipper oil and gas executives – with one message: the US is calling the shots.
“If you want to move US natural gas into the European Union, you have to change the legal regulatory framework,” he told attendees at an event on Friday.
EU rules on corporate supply chains (CSDDD), sustainability targets (CSRD), and a world-first methane regulation – expected to block imports of dirty gas, including US shale – were “kind of a message saying do not do business here.”
“We want to do business here,” Wright said. “And I think that EU countries as a whole want American business here.”
And US energy companies are in it for the long haul, Washington’s energy chief said. The bloc’s dependence on American supplies would be “long-term,” not just the three years until the $750 billion is spent, Wright told Euractiv.
He also demanded that the EU stop all imports of Russian fossil fuels within six to twelve months and replace them with shipments from the US, in remarks to Reuters during a tour of Brussels media offices.
On Saturday, the US president himself pressed NATO countries, most of them European, to “STOP BUYING OIL FROM RUSSIA” and impose 50%-100% trade tariffs on China, one of Moscow’s biggest customers.
Breath of “fresh air”?
The EU was quick to dispel the impression it was letting Washington dictate energy and climate policy. “We will not change our ambitions,” said EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jørgensen. Von der Leyen also reiterated Europe’s commitment to its net-zero goals.
Others, however, welcomed Wright’s tone. “Thank you for your inspiring speech and the breath of fresh air in town,” said François-Régis Mouton, head of the EU division of global oil and gas lobby group IOGP, at the same event on Friday.
The “sound is a bit different from the one we are hearing here, and I think we need it,” Mouton said. The EU’s methane rules were “not implementable, not efficient and not proportionate.”
And the Commission “does not want to listen,” Mouton added. “Those laws have to be fixed,” Wright told him – a message aimed squarely at the EU executive.
(rh, cz)